Trading Standards teams across the UK, particularly at seaports, continue to stop, assess, and reject dangerous and unsafe ladders that are destined for use in the UK.

In June and July, there were nine Product Safety Reports released by the Office for Product Safety and Standards (OPSS) which detailed unsafe imported telescopic ladders from China having been rejected at Port. This follows 17 reports in April alone.

The latest ladders were described as ‘presenting a serious risk of injury’, ‘does not support sufficient load’, ‘no stabilisers’ and ‘excessive bending’. As a result, they did not meet the requirements of the General Product Safety Regulations 2005, and we’re pleased to see they were rejected or destroyed – and for those products due for sale online, were removed from Amazon listings.

We’ll continue to raise awareness of the issue of substandard imported ladders through our ‘Step Up to Safe Ladders’ campaign and we’re committed to supporting trading standards teams through ongoing collaboration and information sharing.